Construction and Pax era
Channel 23 was allocated to Waterville, Maine, in 1987 on a petition from the Passamaquoddy Tribe. [3] The tribe, which owned radio stations in Rockland, [4] had expressed interest in starting a station that would cater to local advertisers in the Waterville area unserved by buying ad time on stations in Bangor or Portland. [5] In spite of the allocation, no one applied for the channel. [6]
This changed in 1996, when five applicants filed for channel 23. The only Maine-based group was Diversified Communications, owner of Bangor CBS affiliate WABI-TV. It proposed locating the station's studios in facilities WABI was leasing in Waterville. [7] Because of a backlog of license applications that were mutually exclusive, stemming from a court-ordered end to the comparative hearings that once chose winning applicants in these cases, [8] the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) allowed for financial settlements in dozens of markets. In this window, WinStar Broadcasting emerged with the channel 23 construction permit. [9] WinStar transferred 49 percent of the permit to Paxson Communications Corporation, owner of the then-new Pax network. [10] The tower to broadcast the new station from Oak Hill Road in Litchfield was erected in 1999. [11]
Channel 23 began broadcasting August 27, 1999, [12] as WMPX-TV. It provided Pax its first broadcast coverage in southern Maine; the network had only been available on cable. [13] In August 2000, Portland NBC affiliate WCSH (channel 6) signed a joint sales agreement to provide advertising sales and limited programming to WMPX-TV. [14] WCSH officials twice mentioned the possibility of airing a newscast on channel 23 but had not done so by 2002. [15]
Fox era
In November 2002, Paxson Communications Corporation announced it was selling WMPX-TV to the Ohio-based Corporate Media Consultants Group for $10 million. [16] Corporate was a joint venture of Max Media and Power Television. [17] The deal led to speculation that WMPX-TV would become Portland's new Fox affiliate. [16] The year before, Fox had cut ties with WPXT (channel 51), whose owner Pegasus Broadcast Television failed to come to a deal with the network. [18] [19] Southern Maine was thus largely dependent on Foxnet for the channel's programming, [16] leaving Fox sports programs at the whim of equipment faults related to syndication exclusivity blackouts or locally irrelevant NFL game selections. Corporate Media confirmed WMPX-TV would become the new Portland Fox affiliate when it took over. [20]
Channel 23 became a Fox affiliate under the new WPFO call sign on April 15, 2003. [21] The station operated from office space on Oxford Street in Portland. [22] Beginning in November 2005, it aired a video simulcast of radio station WLOB's morning show with local headlines displayed on the screen, branded as the Fox Morning News. [23] This continued to air until March 30, 2009. [24]
On February 5, 2007, Portland CBS affiliate WGME-TV began producing a nightly 10 p.m. newscast for WPFO after a news share agreement was established between the two. It aired from a secondary set at WGME's studios. [25] The news relationship expanded in 2010 when the newscast was lengthened to an hour; a new two-hour morning newscast from 7 to 9 a.m., titled Good Day Maine, was added. [26]
On October 31, 2013, WGME-TV owner Sinclair Broadcast Group acquired the non-license assets of WPFO from Corporate Media Consultants Group for $13.6 million. [27] An affiliate of Sinclair, Cunningham Broadcasting Corporation, filed to acquire the license assets for $3.4 million on November 19, but the deal was not approved until June 23, 2017. [28] In 2024, WGME began airing a new lifestyle program, ARC Maine, at 9 a.m.; the morning newscast was shortened to an hour, with the 8 a.m. hour replaced by The National Desk . [29]
Sinclair filed to buy WPFO outright from Cunningham in August 2025, following a decision by the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit that struck down limitations on ownership of two of the four highest-rated TV stations in a market. [1]
